The present invention relates to a stairlift.
Stairlifts have been used for many years in order to carry a person, who has difficulty climbing the stairs of their own accord, up or down the stairs. Such lifts consist of a carriage, upon which the person can sit or stand and a guide track along which the carriage can move.
One of the drawbacks of the known stairlifts is that, in many cases the guide track is of necessity longer than the flight of stairs, such that the track protrudes above the stairs into the landing area and/or beyond the first or second riser at the bottom of the stairs such that the guide track can cause an obstruction. For instance, if there is a doorway in the vicinity of the top or bottom of the stairs, the guide track may prevent or hinder the opening and closing of that door.
In the past this has been overcome by making the ends of the track foldable, such that the portion of the track causing an obstruction can be folded up and back upon itself, away from the top or bottom of the stairs where it was causing an obstruction. The track thus folded cannot be used safely and it is in fact a safety requirement in many countries that the lift must be inoperable when the guide track has been lifted in this way. This has the obvious consequence that if a user of the lift is, say, upstairs, and somebody has folded back the track at the bottom of the stairs in order to leave the house, the user of the lift, if he is alone in the house, cannot unfold the track. Therefore, the lift cannot be used and the user is unable to come down the stairs until someone returns to the house and unfolds the track.
The foregoing drawback has also been overcome by making the track shorter than the stairs with the consequence that the travel of the carriage, on which the user sits or stands, starts and finishes within the length of the flight of stairs. Therefore, the user must hoist himself partially up or down the stairs in order to get on or off the carriage which can be both difficult and dangerous.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a stairlift which overcomes or alleviates the problems associated with the known stairlifts.